Love Letters

I used to spend a lot of time trying to explain to my boyfriend why letters were so much more valuable than a phone call, a text messages or an email. I am not sure if he ever really understood. You can hold a letter in your hand. You can’t do that with an email or a phone call. Ok, so you can print an email, but it’s difficult to treasure that stark white paper with its perfect type. A letter holds an imprint of the person who wrote it. It shows they took that five minutes to sit down with pen and paper. We’re more likely to reveal more of ourselves in a letter than we would otherwise.

During one “episode” when I was trying to explain my overwhelming preference for letters, I almost got my point across. I asked him if he still had the letters I had written him, he said yes, then I asked him how many of my emails he still had, the answer: none. Aha! There is the difference!

I still have letters that my high school sweet heart wrote to me. It’s always refreshing to read them, you get a sense of who you were and how you’ve changed. Love letters aren’t the only ones worth keeping, I keep letters from friends too. Those are always good for a smile and are in some ways greater treasures.

Letters seem to freeze a moment in time, one that you can re-experience any time you wish. The moments they freeze are usually ones that we want to relive as many times as we wish in any manner we choose. Maybe I’m just a sentimental sap. I keep other stuff too, I have ticket stubs from hockey games and movies and each item holds a memory. These are the types of things I’d take with me if my apartment building were on fire, because these are the things that matter

WOULD we but love what will not pass away!
             The sun that on each morning shines as clear
    As when it rose first on the world’s first year;
The fresh green leaves that rustle on the spray.
The sun will shine, the leaves will be as gay
    When graves are full of all our hearts held dear,
    When not a soul of those who loved us here,
Not one, is left us–creatures of decay.

Yea, love the Abiding in the Universe
Which was before, and will be after us.
    Nor yet for ever hanker and vainly cry
    For human love–the beings that change or die;
Die–change–forget: to care so is a curse,
Yet cursed we’ll be rather than not care thus.

BEAUTY                                                       

EVEN as on some black background full of night
    And hollow storm in cloudy disarray,
    The forceful brush of some great master may
More brilliantly evoke a higher light;
So beautiful, so delicately white,
    So like a very metaphor of May,
    Your loveliness on my life’s sombre grey
In its perfection stands out doubly bright.

And yet your beauty breeds a strange despair,
    And pang of yearning in the helpless heart;
To shield you from time’s fraying wear and tear,
    That from yourself yourself would wrench apart,
How save you, fairest, but to set you where
    Mortality kills death in deathless art?

Thanks for being there for me,
through good times and bad times.
I will be on your side even if the the world ends.
When the world is going,
I will be here,
now and until the end.
Your my very best friend.
The one that I look up to.
The one that I run to, when I have a problem.
The one that I talk to.
Your the one best friend that was always there for me.
I wanna thank you for all the things you gave and showed me

Soul Candy

It seems there’s all different types of candy these days. There’s of course the sugary stuff that we have known as candy for years. But lately something that is pleasing to the eye is being referred to as “eye candy," which would make music “ear candy” I suppose. I like the new trend and decided the first column I write should address those things that are pleasing to the soul.

What exactly is “soul candy”? Well, soul candy is any thing we do that makes us feel not necessarily good, but alive. Singing in the shower is soul candy, sleeping in is soul candy, treating yourself to something you don’t really need is soul candy, and of course, reading and writing poetry is soul candy.

Not all poetry makes us smile, which is especially the case with love poetry. Love is messy. Love is a gamble; your heart is the ante. If you attempt to love without putting a part of yourself at stake, then there is nothing for you to gain. And, sometimes the cards aren’t there. But, love really is all it’s cracked up to be, it’s one of the finest emotions we experience. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. Which is why its absence can be so painful.

We do some crazy stuff in the pursuit of love and sometimes fall into it entirely on accident. That’s why there is so much poetry written about it, everyone has their own unique experience and point of view to share. Love is anything but simple. Lovers see the world in bright vivid colors.

There’s music in their silence and smiles in their eyes.

Writing can help you understand your own feelings as well as reading the work of another. You feel that you aren’t alone, and that maybe, just maybe, everything will be ok. And when you’re in the euphoric stage of love you just want everyone to feel this. It’s nothing short of amazing.

So, do what you can to put a little more soul candy in your life. We only live this life once, enjoy it. Feel everything, do everything, and experience poetry on any level you are comfortable with. After all, it’s all about living love and loving l